Truth is a fundamental philosophical concept that, despite its common and everyday use, has resisted common-sense formulations. At this point, one may legitimately wonder if there even is a common-sense notion of truth or what it could look like. In response, I propose here a common-sense account of truth based on four “truisms” that set a baseline for how to go about building an account of truth. Drawing on both ordinary language philosophy and contemporary pragmatic approaches to truth, I defend (...) a pragmatic, common-sense theory of truth. The result is a theory that focuses the use and function of truth while also emphasizing its “subject-independence.”. (shrink)

The late John L. Mackie, formerly of University College, Oxford.

Historians of seventeenth-century science have frequently asserted that Kepler's laws of planetary motion were largely ignored between the time of their first publication and the publication of Newton's Principia . In fact, however, they were more widely known and accepted than has been generally recognized.Kepler's ideas were, indeed, rather slow in establishing themselves, and until about 1630 there are few references to them in the literature of the time. But from then onwards, interest in them increased fairly rapidly. In particular, (...) the principle of elliptical orbits had been accepted by most of the leading astronomers in France before 1645 and in England by about 1655. It also received quite strong support in Holland.The second law had a more chequered history. It was enunciated in its exact form by a few writers and was used in practice by some others without being explicitly formulated, but the majority, especially after 1645, preferred one or another of several variant forms which were easier to use but only approximately correct. The third law attracted less interest than the others, chiefly perhaps because it had no satisfactory theoretical basis, but it was correctly stated by at least six writers during the period under review.Between about 1630 and 1650 Kepler's Epitome Astronomiae Copernicanae was probably the most widely read work on theoretical astronomy in northern and western Europe, while his Rudolphine Tables, which were based upon the first two laws, were regarded by the majority of astronomers as the most accurate planetary tables available.Kepler's work certainly did not receive all the recognition it deserved, but the extent to which it was neglected has been much exaggerated. (shrink)

Although Adam Smith’s thoughts on education have attracted significant scholarly attention, his ideas on how the primary education of children should be funded has been relatively neglected. I re-examine Smith’s nuanced position and argue that Smith had a more flexible view of education funding than has hitherto been recognised. By extending the Scottish educational model, Smith proposed a direct contribution of government to the costs of educating poor children. In addition, his discussion of scholarships indicate that he favoured further indirect (...) subsidies to education. These significant subsidies were designed to ensure that education was accessible and affordable to most people in society, who would only have to contribute a small sum. Furthermore, there is reason to believe that for pupils whose family were unable to support their education, Smith might have favoured a full payment of their fees. Situating Smith’s intervention on education funding within the context of the English and Scottish educational systems reveals a discussion of the role of government in society. The Smithian state that emerges from such a reading actively intervenes where necessary to prevent ‘a publick evil’ (WN V.i.f.60). (shrink)

1. In his recent edition of the De Mysteriis, Mr. D. M. MacDowell has advanced the hypothesis that Andocides, contrary to the generally accepted view, was not guilty of mutilating the Hermae, but guilty of parodying the Mysteries; that, even after he had told what he knew about the former affair, he was kept in prison until, eventually, he confessed to the latter, incriminating, amongst others, his father Leogoras, to gain immunity for himself; and that finally, released and repentant, he (...) helped his father to avoid prosecution. These conclusions are reached in an ingeniously argued series of appendices, in which the author displays a refreshing scepticism towards the evidence of Thucydides. (shrink)

On 6 September 1966, the prime minister of South Africa, Dr HF Verwoerd was killed by Mr Tsafendas, a Portuguese national of Greek descent, in parliament by stabbing him in the chest. Mr Tsafendas was a messenger in parliament. At the enquiry trial of Mr Tsafendas, he was found unfit to stand trial on the ground that he suffered from schizophrenia. The psychiatric evidence during the enquiry trial was reviewed and discussed under the following headings: Diagnosis of schizophrenia; Consideration of (...) cultural factors in forensic psychiatric settings; Delusional infestation v. extreme overvalued beliefs; Simulation of psychosis; Ethical considerations in criminal capacity and trial competency assessments. Lessons from the Mr Tsafendas enquiry trial for forensic psychiatrists where a defendant previously diagnosed with schizophrenia commits a prominent political murder, are summarised. It is emphasised that the personhood of an accused referred for forensic observation should be respected and protected, instead of focusing exclusively on a specific diagnosis. (shrink)

Euphorion SH 417 deserves to be better known. A curiosity in itself—an apparent poetic reference to number theory—it is also, potentially, one of our earliest references to Euclidean material. On the authority of a late commentator on Aristotle, Euphorion, a mid-third-century b.c. Euboean poet who was also active in Athens and Antioch, is said to have mentioned perfect numbers—i.e. numbers which equal the total of all their factors, including 1 . It is a pity that the context in Euphorion does (...) not survive, and that the line is only preserved, and indeed interpreted, by so late a source. But the wording of the fragment—if Westerink's restoration of its various corruptions is plausible—would strongly suggest a reference to the notion of perfect number. The fragment has been known since Westerink published it in 1960, and was included both in Van Groningen's edition of Euphorion in 1977 and in Supplementum Hellenisticum . But its implications have still not been discussed, and when David Fowler came to gather the evidence for references to Euclidean material in and after the third century b.c. in The Mathematics of Plato's Academy, his attention, unsurprisingly, was not drawn to it. Euphorion has had a bad press, as a poet of rebarbatively obscure myth and intractable vocabulary; yet he holds some interest, and we may be missing more insights into the intellectual life of the Hellenistic period which the perverse intelligence and baneful wit of the fragments display. (shrink)

There is a standard tradition in the ancient sources, which makes its first appearance at Thucydides 1.138.5, that, when Themistocles had fled into exile and been given the equivalent of political asylum by the Persian King Artaxerxes, he was ‘given’ the three Asiatic Greek cities of Magnesia, Myus and Lampsacus. There has been a fair amount of scholarly controversy over how the King could ‘give’ Themistocles Lampsacus, a city of great strategic importance on the Hellespont, which, by the mid-460s, was (...) almost certainly within the ambit of the Delian League, i.e. no longer his to give. My concern in this paper is not with that political problem, but rather with a different, though related, issue – whether valid conclusions can be drawn from the Thucydides passage and the subsequent tradition for the social and economic history of these three cities in the classical period. I suggest that they cannot. (shrink)

J.L. Schellenberg offers a path to a new kind of religious outlook. Reflection on our early stage in the evolutionary process leads to skepticism about religion, but also offers a new answer to the problem of faith and reason, and the possibility of a new, evolutionary form of religion.

Lanczos, C. Einstein's path from special to general relativity.--Balazs, N. L. The acceptability of physical theories: Poincaré versus Einstein.--Ellis, G. F. R. Global and non-global problems in cosmology, by G. F. R. Ellis and D. W. Sciama.--Ehlers, J. The geometry of free fall and light propagation, by J. Ehlers, F. A. E. Pirani and A. Schild.--Trautman, A. Invariance of Lagrangian systems.--Penrose, R. The geometry of impulsive gravitational waves.--Exact solutions of the Einstein-Maxwell equations for an accelerated charge.--Taub, A. H. Plane-symmetric similarity (...) solutions for self-gravitating fluids.--Robinson, I. Equations of motion in the linear approximation, by I. Robinson and J. R. Robinson.--Florides, P. W. Rotating bodies in general relativity.--Chandrasekhar, S. A limiting case of relativistic equilibrium.--Israel, W. The relativistic Boltzmann equation.--Thompson, W. B. The self-consistent test-particle approach to relativistic kinetic theory. (shrink)

* This is a fragment of J. L. Schellenberg’s paper “Divine Hiddenness and Human Philosophy” originally published in Adam Green and Eleonore Stump, Hidden Divinity and Religious Belief, 23–25, 28. Reprinted by permission of the author.

J. L. Ackrill; VIII*—Aristotle's Definitions of Psuche, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 73, Issue 1, 1 June 1973, Pages 119–134, https://doi.org.

Annotation In this book Mr. Mackie selects for critical discussion six related topic which are prominent in John Locke's Essay concerning Human Understanding: ...

Tommie Shelby has offered an influential, carefully stated, and well-argued set of objections to any volitional analysis of racism (VAR) as consisting centrally in certain forms of race-based disregard. Here I hope to defend aspects of VAR by analyzing, evaluating, and sometimes countering several of his major contentions, which have stood unchallenged in the literature over more than two decades. First, I sketch and respond to his Methodological objection to VAR, which criticizes VAR's reliance on language and linguistic intuitions; then (...) to a Psychological objection, which suggests that VAR implausibly distances an agent's intentions from her beliefs; and, finally, to a Psychopathological objection, which holds that VAR requires treating as unproblematic some psychological states better seen as aberrant. The following section treats three subtle counterexamples Shelby uses to challenge VAR's core contentions about what's necessary and what's sufficient for racism. I close with some gestures toward what I see as a promising approach, very different from his, to studying these topics. (shrink)

Ultimism and the aims of human immaturity -- Faith without details, or how to practice skeptical religion -- Simple faith and the complexities of tradition -- The structure of faith justification -- How skeptical faith is true to reason -- Anselm's idea -- Leibniz's ambition -- Paley's wonder -- Pascal's wager -- Kant's postulate -- James's will -- Faith is positively justified : the many modes of religious vision.